Posts Categorized / Spirit Of Giving

Clean Ocean Action is a broad-based coalition of 125 active boating, business, community, conservation, diving, environmental, fishing, religious, service, student, surfing, and women’s groups. These “Ocean Wavemakers” work to clean up and protect the waters off our shores. The groups came together in 1984 to investigate sources, effects, and solutions of ocean pollution.

Clean Ocean Action’s staff, under the guidance of the Board of Trustees, researches pollution issues affecting the marine environment, then formulates policy and campaigns to eliminate each pollution source. The staff at Clean ocean Action consists of people who are passionate about what they do and use research to troubleshoot and get results. Clean Ocean action employs individuals who come from strong environmental science backgrounds and have had experience in the real world, and have in turn brought that experience with them to help improve the quality of the water that means so much to all of us. Led by Executive Director, Cindy Zipf, the organization, based at Sandy Hook has been instrumental in bringing to light problems with the quality of our water, striving to eradicate pollution, and educating the public over the last quarter-century.

The Junior League of Monmouth County is an organization of women whose goal is to create committed permanent positive change in the lives of women and children in our county through promoting volunteerism, developing the potential of women, and improving the community through the effective action and leadership of trained volunteers. Continue Reading

The FoodBank began in 1984 when three people saw hunger at the Jersey shore and decided to make a difference. They purchased a small, dilapidated warehouse in Spring Lake. Carpenters, masons and other members of the community donated work, office furniture and supplies. Food streamed in from hundreds of donors. After one year, the FoodBank was serving 25 charities with 100,000 pounds of food.
Ten years later, nearly two million pounds of food was being distributed annually from the same small warehouse. Bursting at the seams, the FoodBank undertook a capital campaign in 1998 to construct a new facility in Neptune. Three years later, the current 40,000 sq. ft facility became a reality.
Today, the FoodBank serves over 260 pantries, soup kitchens and other feeding programs with almost 7 million pounds of food distributed annually.
The Foodbank also operates a culinary training program for people in need of better paid jobs, a kids café and backpack program as well as a mobile pantry and food stamp outreach program. With the help of roughly 1,000 volunteers each year, the FoodBank’s programs are truly a community effort, working to eliminate hunger by providing emergency food, skills training, outreach programs and advocacy for families in need.

Second Life Bikes, in Asbury Park, aims to provide the surrounding communities with the opportunity to purchase a mechanically refurbished bicycle at a reasonable cost, to buy parts and accessories, and to have their own bicycles repaired. Kids who work at Second Life Bikes put in 15 hours of time in exchange for a bicycle of their own, which they restore using the skills they’ve learned. In addition to gaining valuable practical skills, youths are exposed to the value of committing their time to a community organization.
A long-term goal of Second Life Bikes is that all participants, children as well as adults, become integral parts of the ongoing life of the bike shop, ideally learning and growing.
Donated bicycles and parts are vital in sustaining Second Life Bikes; everything they are given is put to good use and given the chance to have a “second life.”